John F. Kennedy Quotes

524 Sourced Quotes

Only in the case of the Negro has the melting pot failed to bring a minority into the full stream of American life.

John F. Kennedy
My experience in government is that when things are non-controversial and beautifully coordinated, there is not much going on.

John F. Kennedy
The only valid test of leadership is the ability to lead, and lead vigorously.

John F. Kennedy
War and hunger and ignorance and despair know no religious barriers.

John F. Kennedy
I know my Republican friends were glad to see my wife feeding an elephant in India. She gave him sugar and nuts. But of course the elephant wasn't satisfied.

John F. Kennedy
I also want to take cognizance of the fact that this flight was made out in the open with all the possibilities of failure, which would have been damaging to our country's prestige. Because
great risks were taken in that regard, it seems to me that we have some right to claim that this open society of ours which risked much, gained much.

John F. Kennedy
Football today is far too much a sport for the few who can play it well; the rest of us, and too many of our children, get out exercise from climbing up the seats in stadiums, or from walking across the room to turn on our television sets.

John F. Kennedy
To that world assembly of sovereign states, the United Nations, our last best hope in an age where the instruments of war have far outpaced the instruments of peace, we renew our pledge of support - to prevent it from becoming merely a forum for invective - to strengthen its shield of the new and the weak - and to enlarge the area in which its writ may run.

John F. Kennedy
A tired nation, said David Lloyd George, is a Tory nation, and the United States today cannot afford to be either tired or Tory.

John F. Kennedy
To each of us is entrusted the heavy responsibility of guiding the affairs of a democratic nation founded on Christian ideals.

John F. Kennedy
I believe the American people are more concerned with a man's views and abilities than with the church to which he belongs. I believe the founding fathers meant it when they provided in Article VI of the Constitution that there should be no religious test for public office. And I believe that the American people mean to adhere to those principles today.

John F. Kennedy
We go into space because whatever mankind must undertake, free men must fully share.

John F. Kennedy
The processes of growth are gradual, bearing fruit in a decade, not a day.

John F. Kennedy
So long as freedom from hunger is only half achieved, so long as two thirds of the nations have food deficits, no citizen, no nation can afford to be satisfied. We have the ability, as members of the human race, we have the means, we have the capacity to eliminate hunger from the face of the earth in our lifetime. We only need the will.

John F. Kennedy
Whatever the political affiliation of our next President, whatever his views may be on all the issues and problems that rush in upon us, he must above all be the chief executive in every sense of the word.

John F. Kennedy
Unless liberty flourishes in all lands, it cannot flourish in one.

John F. Kennedy
Irrational barriers and ancient prejudices fall quickly when the question of survival itself is at stake.

John F. Kennedy
Anyone who is honestly seeking a job and can't find it, deserves the attention of the United States government, and the people.

John F. Kennedy
There is little value in insuring the survival of our nation if our traditions do not survive with it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment.

John F. Kennedy
The final and best means of strengthening demand among consumers and business is to reduce the burden on private income and the deterrence to private initiative which are imposed by our present tax system, and this administration pledged itself last summer to an across-the-board, top-to-bottom cut in personal and corporate income taxes to be enacted and become effective in 1963.

John F. Kennedy
I think it is appropriate that we pay tribute to this great constitutional principle which is enshrined in the First Amendment of the Constitution: the principle of religious independence, of religious liberty, of religious freedom.

John F. Kennedy
The great free nations of the world must take control of our monetary problems if these problems are not to take control of us.

John F. Kennedy
Last year, more Americans went to symphonies than went to baseball games. This may be viewed as an alarming statistic, but I think that both baseball and the country will endure.

John F. Kennedy
No man who enters upon the office to which I have succeeded can fail to recognize how every president of the United States has placed special reliance upon his faith in God.

John F. Kennedy
The Family of Man is more than three billion strong. It lives in more than one hundred nations. Most of its members are not white. Most of them are not Christians. Most of them know nothing about free enterprise, or due process of law or the Australian ballot.

John F. Kennedy
We also need the provisions in the tax bill that will permit working mothers to increase the deduction from income tax liability for costs incurred in providing care for their children while the mothers are working. In October the Commission on the Status of Women will report to me. This problem should have a high priority, and I think that whatever we leave undone this year we must move on this in January.

John F. Kennedy
We have some of the most influential Members of Congress here today, and I do hope that we can get this appropriation for these day-care centers, which seems to me to be money very wisely spent, and also under consideration of the tax bill, that we can consider the needs of the working mothers, and both of these will be very helpful, and I would like to lobby in their behalf.

John F. Kennedy
No responsibility of government is more fundamental than the responsibility of maintaining the highest standard of ethical behavior for those who conduct the public business.

John F. Kennedy
One-third of the world, it has been said, may be free- -but one-third is the victim of cruel repression--and the other one- third is rocked by the pangs of poverty, hunger and envy. More energy is released by the awakening of these new nations than by the fission of the atom itself.

John F. Kennedy
Our responsibility is one of decision, for to govern is to choose.

John F. Kennedy